


stitches and burns

by allsovacant



Series: something to cry on [13]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Emotional Hurt, Gen, Hurt, Johnlock Roulette, Post-Reichenbach, Prompt Fic, Sherlock's recollection of being tortured, The Empty Hearse - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-24
Updated: 2018-09-24
Packaged: 2019-07-16 12:21:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,188
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16085999
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/allsovacant/pseuds/allsovacant
Summary: John Watson returned to the clinic that afternoon and found a note inside a carved wooden heart sitting on his table. He loved the masterpiece even though the edges were burnt. He was happy to receive such an unusual gift. But when he found the note inside, that's when he cried.—The title came from the 1992, Fra Lippo Lippi song of the same title. From the band's sixth studio album, 'Dreams'.





	stitches and burns

**Author's Note:**

  * For [SherKat](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SherKat/gifts).



> Trying my hand at a prompt again:
> 
> (1) Sherlock carves/has someone make a wooden anatomically correct heart [that opens, of course, to show all the inside stuff] and scorches the edges of the outside. He wraps it and leaves it on John's desk at the surgery with a small card that just says "Goodbye, John", then packs up and moves away. [heart burned out, get it?]
> 
> —Cat Guilford  
> (I Am Johnlocked FB Group)
> 
> ••••
> 
> So more or less, this is my messed up result. I've tried. XD
> 
> —Unbeta'ed for the love of mistakes—

Sherlock is lying on the couch, dressed in his usual case clothes and his coat and scarf ready for battle and ready to go in an hour. He have to arrive on John's clinic at exactly four thirty in the afternoon, (John's break) so he could leave his little present and be able to slip off unnoticed. And then he's off for another matter of life and death case.

The case will take months or even a year to be solved. It is a complex one after all. It dealed with treachery, conspiracy, the usual political threat.  
It had always been to Sherlock's delight when one of the minor occupants of the British government—in this case, his insufferable brother Mycroft was politically adrift.

But that was before. Before he has _John_ by his side. Every single case, even the almost life and death ones, always thrilled him. Because they have always been together. But then Moriarty made his presence known then. Lead him astray from John. Now, their small bubble of safety has been broken in pieces. It left him to leave John in grief, betrayal and distrust and Sherlock driven himself in the dreadful feeling of despair.

 _Sentiment is a chemical defect found on the losing side._ He once said to John. And what was its main component? _Love._ Something he thought he was never capable of. But it has changed. Ever since he met John, something in him changed.

John was the very first person that was able to break through him. To unravel his inner self. The one to put back every part of him that was broken. The conductor of light that was able to reach the darkest corners of his Mind Palace. The sandy blonde haired man with a warm smile, who has reached out a hand to a young boy with a riot of curls, sitting alone in the middle of nowhere. In his Mind, the boy took the man's hand, and just like that—Sherlock was no longer alone. He had John. The thing he feared from the start, has now come to life inside him. The realisation that makes it hurt the most.

 _Sherlock Holmes is in love with John Watson._ A one-sided feeling he had contained inside a memory of a wooden heart he had carved when he was a boy.

 

•••••••••••••••••••

This case he's now being assigned to after his successful destruction of Moriarty's web of network might completely wipe him out of John's life.

Which is why he took the case in a heartbeat. John and his chosen better half named Mary, will be wedded in a week.

He will no longer be needed, so it seems. His acceptance of the case prevented him from being an option to be his bestfriend's bestman. But then again, John still appears to still hate him, which is all his fault. So it's alright to suffer. He thought of that for a long while. When he had learned about what John had gone through in the last two years. How much he hurt the man that saved him from himself. So he stayed silent at the cold treatment John had given him.

He didn't tell John why he did the Fall. What Moriarty's men did to him. What happened to him in India, in Belarus—who tortured him at Serbia and alot more places that he still dream of. Waking up in the middle of the night wailing, unable to move. A nightmare that's as cold as John's stare when he sat in front of him as he try to explain himself. As cold as the feeling when John started doubting _him._

But John doesn't need to know.

John doesn't need to know his own suffering. That he had been in the claws of death more than once. But still he struggled to live, to survive, to come back to John.

Sherlock sighs heavily as his gaze drops at the wooden sculpture on the coffee table. A fist-sized anatomically wooden heart that opens in the middle. Carved meticulously, and painstakingly with all of its functional counterpart present. The crack, starting from the top curving to the back opens. Even the edges of the opening were carved to fit the cracks. And then on the inside, it was shallow enough for small things such as paperclips, notes from scratch, and receipts can fit. It was also lightweight for he chose a light wood to use, so if John wants to carry it inside his bag, he could. John would love it. He assumes, main reason, it's not in _flesh_. Why John doesn't like body parts—and the man _is_ a doctor—is beyond Sherlock.

Sherlock could say, the wooden heart made him sane while he was away. He made it while staying in his rented flat in Serbia, while he gathered information for the whereabouts of his last target. The last of Moriarty's minion.

He made it thinking about John, missing John. He made it in seven days between high-fever and coughing spots of blood—between hunger, an almost case of hypothermia and deprivation of sleep—between planning on who's head among Moriarty's associates he'll pull the next trigger. Day and night he perfected it—refining the edges with jackplane until the roughness are barely felt under his blistered fingers. His mind focused only in one goal, to go back to John someday, and to gift him the heart—if things had went well... But before he was able to finish it, he was captured first when he was out to scout his target. And then he was tortured by his foes for informations on who he was working with. Although he succeeded in trapping them in the end, when Mycroft found him and was able to save him, he was barely _breathing._ His body were covered with bruises and his back were decorated with wounds that were stitched and then cut open again. It was the worst part of the torture. It was even worse than the cigarette burns. And John never know that.

After he recovered, he went back to his rented flat to pick up his belongings and most importantly his wooden _heart_ and made his way back to London.

Originally, Sherlock planned the wooden sculpture as a gift to John after their ordeal. A _'Here is my heart, take it,'_ or An _'I am home, John'_ gift and if John accepts, he would even might have the courage to say, ' _John, you own my heart from the very first time we've met—and I just realised, that what I'm feeling for you is love.'_

That would have been marvelous.

Only that never happened between. And never it will.

He came back from his apparent death and was welcomed home with an _almost-death-by-asphyxiation_ on his neck and the news of a proposal, courtesy of his very own best friend.

His phone alarms startling him. It's three in the afternoon. Enough time to travel to the clinic. Sherlock got up from the couch, sitting up, he peels a brown wrapping paper under the coffee table. Flattening the paper on the table, he takes the wooden heart, placing it in the middle. He was about to fold the wrapping when his eyes caught something glistening over the mantlepiece. The sunlight that passes through the window bounces to the silver casing of the thing which directly hits the middle of his forehead. He looks up and stands, as he walk towards the mirror, eyebrows drawn in curiosity.

His gaze ends up on a cigarette lighter. The same one he borrowed from someone named Ernie? Ewan? Erbert?—whoever he was, of the Buckingham Palace. Sherlock twirls the thing in his fingers and remembers John's laugh when the man realised he was only wearing a bed sheet. John's laugh was intoxicating. And the anticipation he felt when he pulled out an ashtray from his suit because he knew John would laugh again. And when John did, a swell of affection scattered inside him. And they laugh together like it's the end of the world.

He returns to the couch, holding up the wooden heart in front of him, and the lighter on the other; and with all the pain he feels inside he lights the wooden heart. The soft warm flame instantly burnt the soft flesh of his thumb. The pain stung, but he no longer cares. He guides the flickering artificial light to the edges of the wood and watched as the polished surface burn to black.

For a good half an hour, Sherlock worked on the final touches of his masterpiece and when he's satisfied, he bins the lighter and extra wrappers and heads out off Baker Street. The faster he gets out of the flat, the better. If he stays there even longer, his memories with John would catch up.

The private clinic was locked when he arrived and the sign that says 'breaktime' hangs losely on the glass door. Sherlock reaches out a hand at the back of his head, by his end curls, plucking off a hairclip. Just like any other day on a case, he picks the door's lock open with efficiency, pocketing the clip and steps inside. When he found John's room, he went in without much preamble. Better to get this over with.

Sherlock closes the door behind him. Then he goes straight to John's table. He pulls out the wrapped sculpture from his pocket, and placed it on the middle. Then he remembered the crack of the heart that opens. He thought of putting something inside it back at Serbia but he didn't have the time to get one. But right now, a single note would be sufficient, still he scrawls another one. When he was finished scrawling the notes hastily, he shove one inside the opening then closes it again. Then he put the other one beside the table.

He then looks around the room for the last time. Then he decides to leave. He was about to go when he heard the scraping noise of a key being turned and the sound of the door being opened. When Sherlock whirls around, he sees John, Sarah and two colleagues, clearly had come back from the break. One of the colleagues says something funny and Sarah laughs heartily. John smiles but it never reaches his eyes. Now the group is going back on their respective rooms and John, obviously, is walking towards the room he's in. Panic assaults Sherlock's chest. His heart hammering. John has his head down while walking so he couldn't see Sherlock _yet_ , through the small window of the door.

Just when he's going to duck his head, Sarah's who's walking behind John _sees_ him. And to make the matter worst, she almost exclaims his name. Quickly, he shook his head fast enough that it made him feel dizzy.

Sherlock ducks from the door, sliding himself on the floor just in time when John peaks in.

If John opens the door he will know.  
Luckily, Sarah distracts John about something she forgot on the diner they had been. And John, as always, the good samaritan, offers to get it with Sarah. Sherlock hears Sarah thanked John and then he hears the man's familiar footsteps sounding far away from the room. The next sound Sherlock heard was of the front door closing and locks.

Sherlock waited for another ten minutes before he stands up. His knees went wobbly that he had to support himself by leaning on the wall.

 _John._ His John. He saw him for the last time. And he couldn't be even more grateful to Sarah. Because if John had found him, he wouldn't know what he could've done. He might've told John ALL of the truth. He might've told John all of his inner feelings. He might've hugged John or kissed John right there and then.  
But he didn't. He couldn't. Because he might've never let John go.

Sherlock propped himself straight up closing the room on John's door behind him. Then he went to the front door and picked the lock for the last time and went outside. He throws the hairclip to the trashbin and turning his coat collar up against the afternoon rain, Sherlock Holmes walked out of the streets of London, and out of John Watson's life.

 

_**A brief epilogue** _

John Watson returned to the clinic that afternoon and found a note inside a carved wooden heart sitting on his table. He loved the masterpiece even though the edges were burnt. He was happy to receive such an unusual gift. But when he found the note inside, that's when he cried.

He got married, had children, had grandchildren, lost his wife, grew old and fade away.

He never saw Sherlock Holmes again. England never knew of the unsung hero that saved them once again.

But Sherlock's heart remained _with_ him from that day on the clinic... beating _inside_ of him until his last.

 

•••••••••••••••••••

_Here lies thine heart,_  
That was no longer mine;  
For it has become yours,  
Until the end of time.

_—SH_

_Goodbye, John_

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading!  
> For the hits, the bookmarks, the kudos and the comments on my works. I appreciate them all!


End file.
